Answer to Question #209922 in English for Titi

Question

1. How many consonants does Iaai have?

2. Compared with Proto-Oceanic, how different is the consonant inventory of Iaai? What do we learn about the evolution of Iaai consonants then?

3. To an Iaai speaker, does it make any difference if another speaker says [ɛ] and [ɛ:], [u] and [u:], [ɔ] and [ɔ:] etc.? Why? Justify your answer.

Answer 1

1. Iaai has a rich phonemic inventory of 37 consonants.
2. The major phonological changes that are involved in Iaai verbal morphophonemics are preaspiration or spirantization of the initial consonant, mutation of the vowel of the root, and occasionally also changes to the final consonant. Iaai distinguishes between “determinate” and “indeterminate” forms of the verb: the former is used with specific objects, the latter with generic or incorporated objects. With some verbs, there are morphophonemic changes in both the vowel(s) and the final consonant. However, Proto-Oceanic syllables were of the form (C)V(C), and the most common POC words were disyllables of the form CVCVC or CVCV, with no medial consonant clusters and with final consonants in some words. (Of course, both longer and shorter words occurred, as did words with initial vowels and with medial or final vowel clusters.) Although certain specific consonants were lost in all or some positions, generally speaking, the POC canonical form was preserved in Iaai and the other Loyalties languages, except at the end of words: final consonants were (with one significant exception) regularly lost, and final vowels were often lost. we learn that vowels can be mutated to consonants.
3. Yes, it makes difference because Unlike many languages with dentoalveolar stops, Iaai /t̪, d̪/is released abruptly, and /t̪/ has a very short voice onset time.